


tea & sympathy

by turtlesparadise



Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Mother and Son, Reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 21:17:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10930209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turtlesparadise/pseuds/turtlesparadise
Summary: Aki returns to Winhill for a visit home to his mother.  They rehash some of the past, and mend their somewhat strained relationship.





	tea & sympathy

**Author's Note:**

> My background for Aki is 99.999% headcanon, since there's virtually no content for him in the game, being an obscure NPC. I've created a little verse/world for him, and I'm slowly adding OC members of his family to that world - this fic features the debut of Teja, Aki's mother.

The trip to Winhill always gave Aki that same clammy-sick clutch in the pit of his stomach, every time. It was one reason his visits to his mother were so infrequent, despite her urging him to come and stay more often, especially as she got on in years.  So many memories in Winhill – bad ones, buried, and Aki wanted to _keep_ them buried.

 _You can’t go home again,_ he thought, staring out the windscreen of the chartered helicopter as it landed on the outskirts of Winhill, beyond a field peppered with poppies and milkweed.

 _Yet here I am trying to do exactly that._ Aki had packed lightly, a small weekender bag all he needed; he’d be staying with his mother, after all.  She’d be sending him back laden with food and gifts – a mother never tired of doting over her eldest (and, probably, her favorite, though she’d never say so out loud) son.

He disembarked, walking down the dust-worn path leading from field to village, toward his mother’s cottage. Winhill had not changed one bit in appearance, yet Teja assured her eldest son that it had changed  - that attitudes had changed for the better.

Aki wasn’t quite sure he’d ever believe it; while rational thought told him that younger generations were more accepting, more open-minded – and less hateful than he’d experienced growing up in this small village – old wounds ran deep, the kind that left no visible scars.  He’d carried them inside all of these years.

Teja greeted Aki with a happy cry, standing on tiptoe to pull him down into a hug.  She stood a full foot shorter than her son – maybe even more, now, as late middle age took its toll on her joints, bending her downward.

“Mama.”   Aki smiled; now he felt like he was home, safe within these four walls and his mother’s arms.  “How have you been?”

“Tired and old, but I can’t complain,”  Teja replied brightly.   “I’ve kept busy in the herbarium.”   She waved for him to follow her out back, to a small patio off of her herb garden.  A clay teapot rested atop a trivet on the small table, two cups set out in anticipation of Aki’s arrival.

Aki took a seat, already pouring out, inhaling the steam and trying to guess what sort of blend _this_ was.

“Chrysanthemum?”  He ventured a guess, and Teja nodded.  

“That, and a bit of dried peony root – and some lavender and sage – “

“Mm.”   He sipped, and nodded approvingly.  “It’s good.”   Aki leaned back, stretched his travel-weary legs out a bit and sighed.  “Business is good?”  After Aki’s father died, Teja had turned to her skills as an herbalist to support herself and her two younger boys, opening her own tea shop in the village – Aki had helped to finance it, quietly loaning his mother the money to purchase the shop – never wanting, or expecting her to repay him.

“Business is great!  By the way.”   She leaned in, elbows on the table, her gaze locked evenly with her son’s.   “We need to talk about gil.”

“What about it?”  Aki stared out at a trellis in the garden, ignoring his mother’s stare and feigning ignorance.

“You _know_ what I mean, Aki.  I’ve enough money to pay you back now – “

“I don’t need for you to pay me back, mama. I’ve told you that.  I _wanted_ to help, I was able to help – and so I did.”

Teja sighed, shaking her head.   “You’re just as stubborn as your father – “

Aki’s demeanor swiftly and suddenly changed; his entire body stiffened, his fingers curled tightly around the handle of his teacup, and he set his jaw, grinding his teeth.”

“Please…do not,”  Aki hissed icily, “compare me to my father. Ever.”

The handle of the cup snapped off and Teja’s eyes widened.  “Aki, please – “

“I’m nothing at _all_ like that son of a bitch.”He left the remains of the cup overturned on the table,  turned away from his mother and then suddenly stood, pacing amongst the raised beds in the garden.   Teja followed him, rested a hand on his arm.

“I didn’t mean it like _that_ , Aki,”   Teja murmured quietly, apologetically.  “I only meant – “

“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just – “  Aki frowned, spun on his heel to face his mother, eyes downcast.   “With everything he put me through – everything he put _us_ through – why?  Why didn’t you leave him?”

Teja sighed, sat down on a teakwood bench, folding her hands in her lap.   “I thought about it.  Many times. He wasn’t always like that, you know – “

“Well, it’s all I can remember,”  Aki cut in. He sat next to his mother, put an arm around her shoulders.  “Listen….I don’t blame you.  Maybe I did, back then – “   He patted his mother’s hand.   “Age has brought me the benefit of hindsight.”

Teja chuckled softly.   “Age does that.  It has for me, as well.  If I knew then, what I know now?  I would have gotten the hell out!”   Her lips set in a thin line, and she stubbornly blinked back tears.  

“I thought he would change. I thought – when you left home – that he’d admit he was wrong.  And that you would come back – “

“He told me I would never be welcome in his home again,”  Aki recalled bitterly.  “I took him at his word.”

“Aki.  I’m so sorry.  Your father and I – we fought for hours, while I sent your brothers out to look for you – but you were just….gone.  As if you’d vanished from the earth.”

“At the time…I didn’t _want_ to be found.  I stowed away on a ferryboat,”  Aki told her.   He leaned forward, rubbing his temples.   “Then I found work in a smithy….which turned out to be a good thing.  I wouldn’t be where I am today, if that had not happened. Fate is a funny thing,”   he mused.

“I was going to leave him, you know.”   Teja’s brows drew together in a frown.  “Lev ruined my plans when he dropped dead a few months later.”  

Aki glanced at his mother and grimaced.  “I wanted more for you.  I don’t remember my father being….any different.”   _Any kinder_ , Aki thought.   All he ever remembered of his father was that Lev was a cruel taskmaster, rigid and inflexible in his opinions, and rather a control freak.

“He changed, somehow, after we married,”  Teja went on. “You think you know a person, but – “   She sighed.  “Winhill brought out the worst in him.  This town was different then too, you know.  Things are much better now.”

“I’m surprised you wanted to move back here, honestly.”  Aki still felt ill at ease just _visiting_ his hometown; he’d hoped his mother would have stayed in Esthar, where she’d relocated for some time after her husband died.

“I thought it would be the best place for my business, and as it turns out….I was right!”   Teja smiled, a pleased expression on her face. “Your brothers are coming by later – Kai is getting married, you know.”  

“ _Kai_ is getting married?” Aki chuckled.  “Hyne – who would put up with him?”

“A saint, is what she is,” Teja chuckled.   She rested her hand on Aki’s arm.  “I hope you’re happy, son.  I’m sorry that I didn’t do better by you.  If I could do it all again…you know I would have done things a lot differently.”

Aki nodded, and hugged his mother.    “You did the best you could, mama.  And you never judged me.  I can’t ask for more than that.”  


End file.
